Punjab is a dominant factor in the Pakistani state due to its resources and population. The one who controls Punjab rules over Pakistan. There have been numerous diamonds in the ever rich history of Punjab.Baba Bule Shah, Waris Shah and Shah Hussain (list is long), all belonged to Punjab. However, the question remains whether their immortal poetry left any impression on the Punjabi mind. The galaxy of poetry is not limited to these stars only. Iqbal, Faiz, Munir Niazi, Sahir Ludhianvi and many more names, and then the illustrious names in the world of music, KL Sehgal, Muhammad Rafi, Noor Jahan, Suraya, Shamshad Begum, Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Madan Mohan and many others. Teachers and artists belonged to this fertile land. Sehgal and Rafi put their field (music) and Iqbal and Faiz in the other field (poetry) gave rise to a new tradition, and those who came later followed them. However, new paths and new destinations could never originate in the political arena from the land of Punjab. An unforgettable exception, however, is Sardar Bhagat Singh, who was a courageous freedom fighter and whose statue should be erected at Shadman Chowk, Lahore, where he was hanged by the British government.
In short, the problem of Punjab has nothing to do with the heritage of poetry and art. The root of the trouble lies in its history. In other fields, many geniuses were born from the land of Punjab, but no king, or a military general opened his eyes here. There is only one exemption, Maharaja Ranjit Singh who founded the first and last Sikh Empire. The rest of the pages of history are blank. It was the wrath of geography that every invader who intended to conquer Delhi encamped in Lahore, the looting armies marched through the plains of Punjab towards Delhi and other fertile plains. They never had to face any resistance on this land of five rivers. Decorated with plentiful stories of romance and adoration, Lahore was like a lover whose beauty could cast a spell on any onlooker.
Multan, which the Punjab elite considered a mild-tempered city, however, resisted Alexander the Great. The great conqueror of the world was wounded near the walls of this city. The Greeks became enraged and carried out a massacre in the city. Multan then resisted the British rule, and after a fierce battle, the British managed to capture the city. Conversely, there are other reasons for Lahore’s historical fame. Its magnificent gardens, river Ravi, tranquil atmosphere and the charming diversity of culture.
However, Islamic republic of Pakistan had other plans, the rulers later emerged to destroy the gardens of this city, filling Ravi with indecent filth, and to bulldoze the ancient architecture. Now one cannot even relate the dreadful condition of the land with Master Madan’s Punjabi song (Ravi de parlay kunday vey mitra)
No major city would have been destroyed by the kind of rage our rulers have inflicted upon Lahore. They swept the streets of the historic Badshahi Masjid and its environs with uncalled for development. Lahore was never besieged by enemy forces like Leningrad. Fighting always took place for the throne of Delhi, but Lahore remained safe from the depredations of war. Its line of destruction was perhaps placed in the hands of our rulers.
In its long history, Maharaja Ranjit Singh was the first ruler to use arms here. He united the different factions of the Sikhs and established a powerful empire. Owing to his political understanding, he did not choose the path of confrontation with the East India Company. He knew that Britain’s military might was far superior to his. On the other hand, the British, while showing reasonableness, did not look greedily at the Maharaja’s throne in Lahore. While pursuing a policy of peace with the British forces, the Maharaja extended his empire to Kashmir where he appointed Gulab Singh as ruler. Gulab Singh used to pay British forces an annual ransom. Meanwhile, the Maharaja defeated the Afghans in a battle near Nowshera and captured Peshawar. When the Punjab was annexed by the British after the death of the Maharaja, they got an empire with wide borders. In other words, Pakistan inherited Peshawar, the tribal area and the Durand Line from the Maharaja’s corn.
When the Partition of India was drawn, East Bengal was a thousand miles away from us, so Punjab was the dominant factor in West Pakistan. At that time, East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) had a slight advantage in terms of population, but the real power was with the Punjab, the Urdu-speaking bureaucracy and the military. The Punjabi feudal elite also sided with the coalition that came into existence after the creation of the new state. The intellectual movement came from the Urdu-speaking class who migrated from India. These people inherited the culture of Delhi, Lucknow, Bhopal and Hyderabad Deccan. Pakistan immediately extended its hand to the West and joined the military alliance with the United States. The flow of cultivating religious ideas and political patronage (which was not any less to the colonial era) seemed to flow from West Pakistan to East Pakistan. The Punjabi element, which was already dominant, became more powerful after the secession of East Pakistan. In the Zia era, the need for a political force to compete with the PPP was acutely felt. So the focus is on those who are before us today in the form of the PML-N, and the newly engineered current PTI leadership, and who have been ruling the country in one form or another for the last thirty years.
The most vital question before us today is that, can Pakistan become a modern state under the guidance of rulers with such tainted history? A state where science, technology, liberal thinking and logic are just for trash bins and the citizens do not have access to modern education and social development opportunities, how can they prosper and compete? That is why the fragile condition of Punjab is so important for the people of this land to understand. This is an opportunity to change the destiny of the province and the state.
Also Read: The Punjab Story
